Gospel Church, Guanghan

Gospel Church, Guanghan
Grace Church
福音堂
Location	Guanghan, Deyang, Sichuan
Country	China
Denomination	Three-Self Church (Protestant)
Previous denomination	Anglican
Churchmanship	Low church evangelical
History
Status	Church
Founded	1902
Founder(s)	Church Missionary Society
Past bishop(s)	William Cassels
Architecture
Functional status	Active
Style	Local architecture (old church building) Modernist architecture (new church building)
Administration
Province	China (formerly)
Diocese	Szechwan (formerly) West Szechwan (formerly; since 1936)
Clergy
Pastor(s)	Guangyu Yu[1]

Gospel Church[a] is a Protestant church situated on Dabei Upper Street, in the county-level city of Guanghan, Deyang, Sichuan Province. Founded in 1902, it was formerly an Anglican church in the West Szechwan Diocese of the Church in China. It has been subjected to the control of the state-sanctioned Three-Self Patriotic Church since 1954. In 2003, a new church was built on Shuyuan Street, and renamed Grace Church.[b][2]

History

Survey of the Church Missionary Society's mission work in Hanchow, published in 1913.

Gospel Church was founded by a Church of England pastor in 1902, belonging to the Diocese of West Szechwan.[2] It is built in local architectural style, with a pseudo-Gothic door topped by a cross.

In 1929, Vyvyan Donnithorne, a member of the Church Missionary Society, together with his wife, arrived in Guanghan (then known as Hanchow). He served as pastor of the Gospel Church until 1949, before being transferred to the Canary Islands, Spain.[3] During his stay in Hanchow, he became a member of the West China Border Research Society, and one of the key figures in the discovery of the archaeological site now known as Sanxingdui.[4]

After the communist takeover of China in 1949, Christian Churches in China were forced to sever their ties with respective overseas Churches, which has thus led to the merging of Gospel Church into the communist-established Three-Self Patriotic Church.

Consecration of a new church took place in 2003.[2] Unlike the original church, the new building was designed in an entirely Modernist style.

See also

• Anglicanism in Sichuan
• Category:Former Anglican churches in Sichuan
• St John's Church, Chengdu – former cathedral of West Szechwan

Notes

1. Chinese: 福音堂; pinyin: Fúyīn táng; Wade–Giles: Fu^2-yin^1 tʽang^2; Sichuanese romanization: Fu^5 In^1 Tʽang^2.
2. Chinese: 天恩堂; pinyin: Tiān'ēn táng; Wade–Giles: Tʽien^1-ên^1 tʽang^2; lit. 'Heavenly Grace Church'.

References

1. Dai, Yuetan (9 December 2016). "四川德阳广汉市天恩堂多人穿以弗得受洗" [Ephods Worn by Numerous Candidates at the Baptism in Grace Church of Guanghan]. gospeltimes.cn (in Simplified Chinese). Archived from the original on 18 May 2021. Retrieved 18 May 2021.
2. Tang, Wanxin (19 August 2016). "四川省广汉市基督教天恩堂简介" [An Introduction to the Heavenly Grace Christian Church at Guanghan, Sichuan]. gospeltimes.cn (in Simplified Chinese). Archived from the original on 18 May 2021. Retrieved 18 May 2021.
3. Ao, Tianzhao (2000). "三星堆古文化、古城、古国遗址发现始末" [The History of Discovery of the Ancient Sanxingdui Culture, and Ruins of Ancient Cities and Kingdoms of Shu]. 巴蜀史志 [Historical Records of Bashu] (in Simplified Chinese) (4): 39. ISSN 1671-265X. Retrieved 18 May 2021.
4. Xu, Jay (2011). "Lithic Artifacts from Yueliangwan: Research Notes on an Early Discovery at the Sanxingdui Site". In Silbergeld, Jerome; Ching, Dora C. Y.; Smith, Judith G.; Merck, Alfreda (eds.). Bridges to Heaven: Essays on East Asian Art in Honor of Professor Wen C. Fong, Volume I. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-15298-1.